With 2019 Lok Sabha poll less than two years away, Uttar Pradesh (UP) is on course to witness road and highway projects to the tune of over Rs 2 lakh crore taking off in the near future.

In fact, some of these projects are already underway or the preliminary ground works have already been completed for speedier takeoff.

UP, politically the most crucial state, elects the maximum number of 80 parliamentarians in Lok Sabha and any party which performs well in UP has always enjoyed an enviable status in Parliament and in the national politics in general.

The stupendous poll performance of the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2014 Lok Sabha election was largely attributed to its good showing in UP, where it won 73 of the total 80 seats and helped the party come to power. In 2017 UP poll, BJP got 325 seats of the total 403 seats in the state assembly and regained power after a gap of nearly 15 years.

In this context, UP is important for the ruling BJP to keep its victory juggernaut marching ahead in 2019 too, while Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath has the perfect opportunity to prove his administrative and governance skills by ensuring its good showing.

Like the previous Akhilesh Yadav government, the Yogi dispensation has accorded priority to the road infrastructure. The current regime has not junked road projects started or proposed by Yadav and is, on the contrary, accelerating these projects to improve connectivity and boost socio-economic growth.

Meanwhile, National Highways Authority of India (NHAI) accounts for the bulk of the road projects estimated at over Rs 200,000 crore in the state. In fact, projects worth Rs 60,000 crore are already underway or completed.

The Centre has also proposed to upgrade the Lucknow-Kanpur National Highway to eight-lane at an estimated cost of Rs 10,000 crore, which would be completed by 2019.

Earlier, the Akhilesh Yadav government had provisioned over Rs 32,500 crore in last year’s budget for the highways and expressways in run up to 2017 poll. It included Agra-Lucknow Expressway, which was estimated to cost Rs 15,000 crore, apart from Lucknow-Ballia Expressway, which is now estimated to cost Rs 22,000 crore, up from its initial projection of Rs 18,000 crore.

Last year, Union Highways Minister Nitin Gadkari had also announced that road projects of over Rs 2,00,000 crore would be launched in UP over the next couple of years and before 2019. He had also laid foundation of three such projects during his visit to the state. These pertained to Varanasi, Jaunpur, Azamgarh and Ghazipur districts in Eastern UP, where BJP has been making steady inroads over the past few years.

Yesterday, Yogi had met Gadkari in the national capital and sought central funds for the state road sector.